Kate didn’t allow herself fear, not that she ever had. The first time she’d seen Doc kill one of them, all the fear had fled, replaced by a calm. Knowing what lived in the night, knowing instead of imagining, was power. It was a power that could chase away fear.
If you were certain of what lived there, and Kate wasn’t certain of much, as she watched Doc lick his lips and smell for her sweat on the wind.
“Well, come ahead then, little woman,” he taunted her. “Turn me into a cinder pile, if you can.”
“You know I can’t,” Kate says quietly. “Not that way. I could never match you at shooting and fighting while you were alive and I sure as hell can’t now.”
“Then I suggest you pack up and try to make it out of town before I get across this distance.” They stood barely an arm’s length apart. “Because if I catch you you’re going to be with me for ever, Kate. I promise you that.”
Kate raised her chin. Raised her voice, too, so it echoed off the rude shacks of Perdition and the mesa beyond. Priestly, the kid, watched. The vampires watched. Kate shut her eyes. “I saw you first, across a crowded beer hall. You were dealing faro. You had gold hair and I swear it was the brightest thing in the room.”
Doc’s voice pitched down until it was nearly a snarl. “Shut your mouth, Kate.”
“You never treated me like I was stupid or frail,” she kept on. “You spoke to me like I was a man and you held me like I was worth something.”
“Kate.” It was a threat this time, and she opened her eyes. Doc’s death mask of a face had gone wary, and around them the vampires were moving closer. She saw shadows now, men in dark preachers’ suits, women in the tattered vestments of whores. Smelled that cloying sick stench of decaying bodies.
“You trusted me with your worst secret, and you trusted I’d believe in all of this,” Kate whispered. “You and I had something that no one else had, Doc, and because of that I fell in love with you.”
She had vowed that she wouldn’t cry over him, but a tear slipped out and she let it go, cutting an arroyo in the dust on her face. “You weren’t some pig-ignorant gambler and you weren’t a cold-blooded killer and you weren’t Doc – you were John Henry Holliday, and only I got to see that.”
She reached out, slowly, slowly and touched his face. It was the same as the air, but she never wanted to let go. “You’re my John,” she repeated in a whisper. “And I know you can still see that.”
For a long moment, longer than any she’d experienced, Kate thought that Doc was going to kill her, simply dip his head forwards and drain her dry.
Then he broke. He grabbed on to her and buried his face in her neck, with no hint of lip or fang. His cold, stiff body racked itself with shuddering.
“Kate,” he whispered. “Kate. I know who I am.”
“Yes,” she murmured, stroking his hair. It was dirty and wanted a brush. “It’s all right, John Henry. We’re going to make it right.”
“I’m so sorry,” John whispered. “For those I killed. For not sending you a message at the end.”
“It’s all right,” Kate repeated. “I’m here for you, John. Just like I promised.”
“They won’t . . . ” He pulled back from her, scanned the figures holding a loose half-circle in the street. “They won’t let me go.”
“They will.” Kate pointed at the vampires, her finger sweeping like a rifle sight. “A life for a life. I stop hunting all those gathered here, and they let us walk out of Perdition, together.”
Kate looked at Priestly, who hadn’t moved. The Tennessee boy had nerve, she would credit him that. “You, kid. Find two horses and then follow us. But don’t come close until I give a word.”
Priestly nodded and slipped off. Doc leaned against Kate, heavy like he would after a night of too much whiskey.
“Where are we going?”
Kate let them pass through the outer cordon of the gathered vampires before she answered. “Away, John. We’re just walking away.”
John understood, and she knew it when his weight pulled away and he walked upright, like the man she’d known him to be. “Thank you, Mary Katharine.”
She nodded her head. “You’re welcome, John Henry.”
Kate walks with John past the cemetery, past the owl gliding slowly above them looking for mice and lizards. Past the cottonwood trees and out onto the mesa. They will walk as far as it takes. Kate will listen to John Henry Holliday’s last words. She has already said her goodbyes.
When it is over, she’ll move on. Colorado has taken her fancy. She doesn’t have a pact with any of the vampires there. Or perhaps back to Kansas, or Missouri. The thick fog of the Mississippi hides night creatures of all stripes, and Kate still has killing years left in her.
But that is the future. Right now, Kate is walking with Doc. They walk in a straight line across the desert floor and beyond the mesa. When it’s time, Kate will sit with Doc on a flat plateau or a stone rearing from the desert floor.
They will sit together, silent. And like so many mornings before, when they’ve been together all night, they’ll watch the sun come up.
* * *
And there you have it, reader – the truth of what happened in Perdition, to Miss Kate Elder (née Mary Katharine Horony) and to Mr John Holliday, plain and accurate as I could make it.
Miss Elder never wept when I came up on her with fresh horses. She took the smaller of the two, thanked me in a most decorous manner, and advised me to forget what I had seen.
I could not accede to her wishes, of course, but in my truthful retelling have tried to be accurate and logical, without giving over to sensation. I swore that morning that I would put away the whiskey bottle and the demons it conjured, and I’ve largely managed. There are worse demons in this world.
I went back to Tennessee and then to the Great Lakes, and along the way I had tried my best to impart the truth, where the truth need be told:
There are things in the night that are not people, and there are people in the night who stand guard. I endeavour only to be one of them, and to watch over the daylight world as those who came before me did, ever vigilant and never resting.
That is the whole of it. That is the truth, and nothing more.
James Priestly
Chicago, Illinois
December 12 1913
Deliver Us From Evil
Dina James
How he hated rainy nights.
Water rejected the dead, and though he wasn’t technically “dead”, he was certainly soulless, and the deluge from the sky apparently made no distinction.
Beneath his long black coat his skin burned in protest as he trudged through the downpour. All right, it wasn’t a “downpour” or a “shower” . . . this was a storm. The meteorologist should be eviscerated for that deception. The harsh wind didn’t make the rain coming down in curtains and sheets any easier to navigate through.
A nightclub he knew that boasted a generous clientele boasted nothing tonight but an empty parking lot. The sign advertising “live nude girls” flickered valiantly in its struggle against the weather.
His hunger urged him on, in spite of the vacant parking lot. It was a driving, persistent need that he could never satisfy, no matter how often he fed.
Marcos crossed the street, and another, then turned the corner and walked on through the deserted city. He was about to resign himself to another hungry night when a light several blocks ahead of him caught his keen eyes.
He cursed the rain again. Water of any kind made it difficult to use his ethereal abilities, and flowing water made it even more so. Had it not been pouring, he could have simply thought about where he wanted to be and appeared there, safely veiled from the perception of any humans around. In this, however, he was forced to walk.
Like a human.
He rolled his eyes at the irony. He hadn’t been human for well over 400 years.
As he neared the light, he curled his lip in disdain. Even if the harsh glow of hot pink neon hadn’t stung h
is light-sensitive eyes, the tackiness of the sign alone would have blinded him: psychic open.
Marcos almost turned away. Ravenous or not, he was not about to set foot in such a place. He crossed himself out of old habit, then laughed and shook his head. What was he trying to do, ward off evil?
He was the evil one. The soulless one.
The psychic one.
Just as he was about to go back the way he’d come, something on the small barred window caught his eye. It was the symbol on the glass of the shop, mostly hidden behind one of the bars that covered the window.
A human wouldn’t have noticed it. Marcos stared at it, entranced, forgetting his insistent hunger momentarily as he tried to remember what it meant. He knew it meant something important, but he couldn’t quite recall what it was. A vague feeling of comfort – of safety – stirred within him. It was almost similar to the momentary sensation of peace that echoed through him after he’d fed, before the hunger returned, merciless and unrelenting, demanding more.
He remembered the word for the feeling. Relief.
Why would he be relieved by that symbol? What did it mean?
He found himself reaching for the glass door to the small shop. It, too, was barred. It would be, in this part of town. Even as he opened the door, Marcos heard gunshots and sirens piercing the night. They were far away, but his sensitive ears heard a great deal, even with the falling rain deafening him as it splattered against the pavement of the empty city streets.
The additional weight of the bars didn’t prevent him from jerking the door open effortlessly. Bells clanged loudly above his head and at his side as he entered. Marcos winced against the noise and glared at them in annoyance as the door shut behind him.
Ay, Madre de Dios.
Marcos was tempted to cross himself again out of sheer horror. His eyes widened as they took in the room.
Dark purple and red fabrics of every hue and texture seemed to drape every possible surface, from the walls and countertops to lamps and tables. Even the chairs, in which one presumably waited while the . . . “psychic” was busy with other clients, were adorned with bits of hemmed cloth over the arms and backs.
The room was also bedecked in stars, angels, various crystals and prisms, and drowning in the overwhelming scent of incense. The pungent odour of patchouli assaulted him, and Marcos wrinkled his nose. He crossed the room to the “burner” that held the offending, noxious sticks and glared down at it. A card on the table next to it read “Madam Marina – Psychic, Spiritualist and Astrologer”, along with a telephone number, the address of the shop, and a list of her offered services in purple ink.
What was it with purple?
A tinkling sound caused him to turn, and he stifled his laughter with effort. The woman that had emerged through the curtain of large brass discs stopped in the doorway and eyed him coolly, appraising him. He returned the favour.
She looked as tacky as the room did, and may as well have been one of the chairs, dressed as she was in a flowing tunic of purple and equally loose trousers of red. Scarves adorned her neck and hair, reminding one of a pirate wench or a Renaissance Faire worker gone mad.
He doesn’t look like a thug, Marina thought to herself as she looked over the man who had entered her shop. Clean, and well dressed and, though his dark hair was longer than usual, it wasn’t like the gang types wore theirs. He didn’t look like a punk. Besides, he was too old. Not that his age really made a difference, but the ones who made trouble for her weren’t usually his age. He looked a little older than she was – maybe thirty or thirty-five. He was certainly good-looking. Gorgeous black eyes. Dark, handsome features, with a day’s growth of beard roughening his upper lip and chin.
“Have you come in seeking answers, or just a moment out of the storm?” Marina asked.
Marcos stifled his laughter again. What kind of accent was she trying to fake? He’d rarely heard such an affectation – it sounded more like she was covering up an unwanted speech impediment than any kind of regional inflection. He supposed that she was aiming for something Old World. Romanian, or possibly Italian. Whatever her aim, she was missing her mark. Woefully.
“Neither,” he replied, his own rich, cultured voice seeming out of place in this tacky, fake environment. He pointed to the symbol painted on the window that had drawn his attention. “I . . . that symbol . . . ”
“Yes?”
“Why is it there?” Marcos asked, his own brow furrowing as he considered the symbol from the inside this time, unhindered by bars.
“What do you mean?” Marina asked, trying not to let her discomfort show. This guy was seriously starting to creep her out. “It is a guardian spirit – a protector. An avenging angel, if you will.”
Angels. He remembered something now. Not an avenging angel. A vengeful angel. Wroth and powerful, cursing him to endure limitless hunger until he –
Until? Until what?
He couldn’t remember.
Marcos turned to the woman again. By God, her clothes were garish. It was hard to look at her.
“Do you have a question you wish to address to your spirit guide?” she asked.
Marcos snorted rudely. “No. Nor is there any such thing. Spirits don’t guide, and angels do not watch protectively over each of us.”
“Well, that is what that ‘symbol’ you show so much interest in is meant to portray,” Marina replied. “If you have no questions, perhaps you should leave now. The rain seems to have lessened a bit.”
His eyes swept over her. Her nervousness had caused her blood to rise, colouring her cheeks, inciting his ravenousness further. Why was he hesitating?
A glint of silver hidden by the ridiculous folds of her top caught his eye. The pendant that flashed into view was the same symbol as that gracing the window.
Again, his hunger quieted at the sight of it.
“Unless of course you wish a reading. Your aura is very strong. Or perhaps tarot?” he heard her ask.
Marcos made a rude noise. Auras radiated from the soul, and he didn’t have one for her to read. He’d exchanged his soul for immortality, as all his kind had.
He was a vampire, cursed to maintain his own existence by feeding on the blood of those he sought to outlive. And then some, he thought wryly.
“I have no need of your . . . services, mujer.” Marcos laughed at himself for his choice of words. She was far from any kind of “lady”.
“Then it is certainly time for you to be on your way,” Marina said, annoyance serving to muster her courage. She stepped into him and took him by the forearm, attempting to twist it as she’d seen the bouncer do more than a few times at the club where she used to work.
Marcos looked down at her hands on his arm and raised an eyebrow. Did she think she could physically remove him? Harm him?
He almost laughed, but managed to keep it contained.
Marina let go of his arm – he wasn’t about to budge if he didn’t want to, it seemed. Strong for someone who didn’t look like he had a lot of muscle. Deceptive. She scowled at him.
“I will ask you once more to please leave,” she said, exasperated.
Marcos noticed her “accent” slipped slightly. Her cheeks were pink and her blue eyes flashed. She was upset with him.
For some reason, Marcos didn’t want to be the cause of this woman’s annoyance. He wanted to move her, certainly, and it shocked him to realize he wanted to goad her passion – albeit passion of a different sort.
Her tone made him study her carefully, his sensitive eyes seeing past the ridiculous layers of red and purple material to the woman wearing them. She wasn’t as tall as he – no surprise there. Few reached his six-foot four-inch height. The hair that had escaped the scarf she’d wrapped around her head was dark brown, or possibly black, and it didn’t go well with her soft blue eyes. A light mask of freckles dotted her nose and cheeks, but didn’t take away from her fair complexion as her dark hair did.
He smiled inwardly for noticing such details. He’d
long since ceased paying attention to humans. They were food – a biological necessity for continued survival – nothing more, so . . . what did she or her upset matter? Why hadn’t he simply entered, taken her blood as well as her life, and been done with it? Why was he attempting to be a gentleman? He wasn’t even human, and she appeared to be a poor excuse for one. Still, oaths meant something to his kind, even if they didn’t mean a great deal to humans.
Marcos lowered his eyes, and bowed his head, then turned and left the shop without another word. The bells on the door announced his departure with a bang as he vanished into the night.
Marina raised her eyebrows, stunned. She went to the door and pushed it open slowly, poking her head out and looking down one side of the street and then the other to see where he’d gone. There was no sign of him.
Shaking her head, she went back into the shop and pulled the door shut. She locked it and pulled the chain on her lit sign, turning it off. There wasn’t a need to be open any longer; not with this weather. Other than . . . Strange Weirdo Man, no one had even passed by her window since the rain had started earlier that afternoon.
Besides, she didn’t have any more appointments – not that she’d had any today, anyway – and it was almost closing time. Sighing, Marina pulled the curtains across the storefront windows and door.
Her brow knitted in confusion and she knelt down. She pressed her fingertips to the carpet where he’d stood, surprised to find that it wasn’t at all wet. There wasn’t any water trailing from the doorway, either.
And, she realized as she stood, his hair hadn’t been wet. He’d been completely dry, though she’d heard him come in from the rain, and watched him . . . watched him disappear back into it.
Marina shivered, then laughed at herself for being freaked out. It was cold in here, and rainy and spooky outside in the darkness. Suddenly the candles in the room seemed a lot more comforting.
Ah, Mar, you’re letting all this psychic stuff get to you, she chastised herself. You know none of it is real.
Love Bites UK (Mammoth Book Of Vampire Romance2) Page 14